OCCUPY STUDENT DEBT

Each state should pass a law stating that in order to borrow money to pay for a state college high school seniors must attend a student loan debt lecture given by college seniors - not the school finance office. In other words…don’t go to college on student loans…it’s just too risky. Once the pool of incoming fresh meat dries up the colleges and lenders will have a reason to make some changes, but as long as there are new suckers to be had this nightmare will continue. It may be too late for a lot of you, but you all could really help others by getting involved in warning young people about the trap that’s been set for them.

Mark Twain did it.  Henry Ford did it.  Johnny Unitas did it, too.  So did Burt Reynolds, Wayne Newton, Donald Trump, Jose Canseco, and MC Hammer.  Even George Jefferson did it when, after “moving on up,” he started moving back down.  Millions and millions of people have done it.  So why can’t I?

            What all these guys did, what I can’t do, is file for bankruptcy.  All of them made bad investments, borrowed too much money, and maybe spent too much too. But when the courts saw the drastic discrepancy between what they owed and what they were likely to earn, they interceded and worked out a deal that allowed them to pay only a fraction of their debts. 

            And what about me?  I made a bad investment.  I invested in myself and in the future of our education system, two lost causes in retrospect.  I borrowed too much.  The federal government was only too happy to subsidize my borrowing of significant sums for every year of graduate school.  I spent too much.  I went to study in another country in pursuit of my chosen career path, and traveled to still others in the effort to advance its cause.  But what did it all come to in the end?  A whole lotta nothin’.

            Actually, far less than nothing.  I wish it was nothing.  But, no, my hard work and determination and years of sacrifice came to -$62,000, -$77,000 with the collection agency’s punitive penalties.  And who hired the collection agency?  The same federal government that was only too happy to subsidize the loans in the first place.

            In the eyes of my government I’m sure my paltry five-digit debt looks like nothing.  After all, that government itself is in debt well over $15 trillion.  And to all those famous people I named above too, I’m sure my debt, equal to the amount which an unsuccessful stockbroker spends on a car, looks like a trifle.  Well, maybe not to Mark Twain or Henry Ford, but there’s been a lot of inflation in the century since they went bankrupt.  In any case, unlike the federal government, which doesn’t really seem to have to answer to anybody, and unlike the famous names on my list, who at some point earned oodles of cash, I am and have always been worth nothing.

            Oh yeah, I’ve got an education…in philosophy.  But philosophy factories that pay six-figures don’t seem to exist.  In fact, no philosophy factories seem to exist at all.  There are only universities, and they are cutting back on the humanities more and more.  Besides, I failed my first dissertation defense anyway, and my funding and visa ran out before I was able to try again.  So I didn’t even get the chance to impart to another generation of duped teenagers the worthless academic wisdom to which I’d devoted an entire decade.  My hopes and dreams and ten years of studying and reading and writing 80 hours a week were dashed to pieces, along with my right to live in the place where, for eight years—most of my twenties—I’d called home. 

            And when I came back to America with my tail between my legs, devastated at having to abandon a ten-year project that was my plan for the future, did the federal government receive me with a friendly, “welcome back to the land of opportunity?”  No.  All they said was, “where’s our money?”

            Where’s your money?  It’s in the same place that your promises of success with hard work and education are, the same place that my happy and productive future is, the same place as your American Dream: the wonderful, magical fantasy world of Neverneverland.

            No one’s going to give me those ten years of my life back.  No one’s going to give me back the space in my brain that I spent years filling with what turns out to be completely useless information.  And no one’s going to give you back your money.  All I can do now is teach English part-time at an hourly rate, and the money I make from that I need for things like eating, and housing, and paying for gas and car insurance to get to my low-paying job.  Oh, and health insurance that I won’t use and can’t afford.  Just accept it, federal government, and let’s agree to a lower amount that I can reasonably afford.  Don’t worry, you’ll never be as shafted by taking less as I have been by buying all your BS.

            Johnny Unitas was too old to play football again.  MC Hammer was too old to make cool music again.  Burt Reynolds had a miraculous comeback, and George Jefferson had a minor one.  Wayne Newton and Donald Trump sold their proverbial souls to make money again after they went bankrupt.  Unfortunately, no one wants to buy mine.  Unless, you do, federal government.  I’ll sell you my soul for $77,000, what do you say?  I’ll even sign in blood and everything.  But I must warn you, it’s pretty well disillusioned, pretty well corrupted, and pretty much broken.

            If that doesn’t work for you, how about you just let me declare bankruptcy like all those other schmucks that made some bad decisions and now have to live with them?  After all, what is to me a tidal wave threatening to destroy my life is only a drop in the ocean of your own financial stupidity.

            Bankruptcy for student loans, because we were our own bad investments.

I’m 27 yrs old and I owe about $22K in private loans. When I checked the balance the loan grew to $39K. I took the loan out about 5yrs ago and I have had to do forbearance during the course of the five years because of the fact that I was not making enough money. I was on and off jobs and whats really worse is that when the economy collapsed, it has become hard to find stable employment. I have been unemployed for the past 2yrs. Finally, I got a statement from Sallie Mae saying that I had to pay the full loan upfront or other wise I was going to into collections. In order for me to get into a repayment program I had to use a bank account so that they could debit the monthly payments. I had to borrow money just so that the loans would not go into default. The customer rep Teresa told me that if I default, its like defaulting on a mortgage. She even told me that I can let the loan go into default and that maybe the debt collector would settle with me. Sallie Mae is nothing but a botched company that takes the principal amount and triples it. I even tried to settle the loan even with a 1% to 2% and they said we cannot do that. They should know that if something happens in which someone becomes deceased especially if you do not have children nor are married, Sallie Mae you lose the money that was owed to you. There will be no one to go after. They need to accept the money that is offered and at least look that I am willing to pay. People if you must file a complaint with consumerfinance.gov they will listen as action must be taken.

Dear Friends,
       I need help. I graduated college in 2009 following the phantom American Dream. I left Truman State University with a whopping $100,000 in student loan debt through private lenders. Yes, it’s a soul crushing amount, and no that’s not the complete amount, for there are also government loans. This amount is with the private loan organization known as Sallie Mae. The only way I was going to be able to go to college in the first place was by taking on student debt.  My family is very practical with money, and never have had success needed to finance much beyond basic amenities and getting me an my sister what we needed to do the best we could.   I admit that I did not watch my money, or prepare well enough for the future costs, or was properly educated to handle financial realities. I thought that I would do the normal life pattern and graduate and find a well paying job with benefits in something I would be proud of.  Lucky for me I remember talking with Sallie Mae a semester before graduation, and seeing the engineered stock market crash go down 800+ points.
       Fast forward to today. I found an entry level position at Best Buy, a soul crushing organization of it’s own. I worked there for 2 and 1/2 years. All I have to show from it is a $5 gift card to Chik-Fil-A, stress weight form the lovely hours, and back problems which I cannot address since I’m not “fortunate” enough to have health insurance. I finally found some kind of reliable work at an insurance company. I make a laudable 9800$ last year, and am on track for the same failure of an amount. I am a devoted worker who is always on time and picks up extra shifts to just make some kind of a survival.  Even the spirit of wanting to work hard and make something of myself is not enough. What I need help with is some way to fight back against this mega-corporation that is not only harassing me constantly, but also is controlling nearly every aspect of my life. Sallie Mae gave me a very…gracious…6 months to somehow find a job where I would have around 2k a month as disposable/loan income immediately. They have called nearly every day for the past 2 years between 10-60 times a day from a multitude of different numbers. They will call to remind me of what a bad and stupid person I am for not getting a well paying job the moment I graduated.  I was on the phone for 2 hours with a financial administrate named Audry trying to find some way to pay.  She berated me for getting a new car, a car that I researched the city I live in and the surrounding counties for the best deal on.  She said that I should have bought something cheaper if my car was currently falling apart.  Well I cannot since my credit is wrecked by you, Audry.  She then made me feel worthless and interrogated me for not getting further education, or getting a better job.  She told me that it was necessary to pay this loan back above “all other priorities”  for taking out a loan “which is almost a mortgage”, then berated me more for not having a better job. They then insist on making me list every detail of my finances to them. Yes, I understand that it’s a needed step to determine costs and such for repaying the loan. But, when you call me and ask for this information, then take $150 from me to “forebear” this loan for 90 days, and then call me back within the hour asking for the same information and $ again… something is wrong. Oh, and they are not just having a clerical error. They told me I could forebear and defer and whatnot as long as needed, then one day when I scraped together $150 to forebear again, guess what “you are out of forbearances”.  They will call and harass me immediately after I pay them. I finally, to have some sanity took each and every one of their nearly 24 different numbers and blocked them on my phone. If they need something they can take the whole 20 seconds to leave a voice mail and a call back number. I will call them back as soon as possible so they can make me feel like a worthless human.
        It has come to the point where the letters, calls, threats to my family’s future, threats to my grandmothers social security, threats on the house, have started to erode my family down. I try to call and set up a plan to pay them back, but they do NOT care what I say, or what plan I put into place. It will change the next week or 2 after I set something in place. Now it has come to the 11th hour, where after agreeing to a set monthly amount they are going to continue on with defaulting my loans. Now after only 3 years, a $100,000 loan has turned into $180,000 from insane interest capitalized on a quarterly basis to the principle, AND the default will go to collections making the sum close to $200,000. My wages, what wages there are, will be garnished. My parents wages will be garnished. My taxes will be taken. My credit rating is in the low 500 now, and will continue to plummet for the rest of my life. My insurance license, the ONLY means of making an income currently has the potential to be revoked for the default, or so I have been told. My families house has the potential to be foreclosed on, or have a lean placed against it. All for what? A piece of paper?
       I am a good man. I have fought for good my whole life. I have done everything to make the lives of those around me better, or happier. I have saved 2 men’s lives by helping them while they tried to take their own lives through violent means, stopping them and getting help for them. I have brought a better life for my clients and people I meet. I helped a complete stranger save $1,500 a month by finding a plan for medical insurance that was not even with my own company. I sidestepped a massive commission to help her, and her family. But, I am cursed now to forever be on a spiraling slide into pain, failure, and indentured servitude. Sallie Mae is completely out of control. I believe in old fashioned ideologies, where if I tell you I can do something, don’t berate me for that commitment and demand almost 10-20 times more from me. You CANNOT discharge student loan debt with both chapter bankruptcies.  I know you all know the majority of what I am writing, and I’m sure your probably thinking that I am a terrible person too, but I have to try and FIGHT.
         I want with all my heart to pay this off. It has been a constant in my life. The physical stress is killing me literally. I cannot move anywhere in my life because of this debt. I cannot get a good car on my own without having to ask family for more help, cannot meet the love of my life since all my money goes away the moment I receive it. I cannot move into my own place from the lack of money. I live with my parents who love me, but I can see the fear and disappointment in their eyes every day. I will not be able to find a good job from having a bad credit score. I cannot buy a house. I cannot do anything social so I read books from the local library. I have not taken a vacation from constant work in years and years and years. I AM TRAPPED LIKE THIS FOREVER. It has made me even consider killing myself to remove this debt…but wait, I cannot even do that since the debt will just transfer to my parents.  In the past 10 years my mother has nearly died 2 times from a massive infection from Medically Resistant Staff, and later a routine disk surgery placed her in intensive care for almost a month and a half.  Best Buy demanded I come to work before seeing her, which I did.    My father’s health is also on the decline with multiple heart attacks in the past 2 years.  They cannot physically take up second jobs to help pay.  I work 60+ hours a week trying to build a business and find some income.  The medical bills alone for that are destroying the family, now my failures are what seems like a death blow. I am turning into a bitter and angry man, and I am not that person at all. I need help or someone to fight with me, beyond the shackled means I currently have. Stand up and Fight against this terrible organization. It is enslaving our generation for life and eroding the middle class. Student Loan debt is the next “housing bubble” waiting to happen. Please Please PLEASE HELP ME. I was just for trying to break into a better life for me and my family by going to college, now it seems I’m just taking everyone down with me. I am a slave with an ever growing invisible yoke around my neck.

I was the first and only child in my family to attend college. Without any financial guidance whatsoever, I was told that it was the key to unlocking my dreams. For, nobody could get a job without going far. So, I signed up for an Associates Degree.

I needed books, so I took out a loan for books. The friendly financial aid clerk handed me some paper work, I filled it out. It seemed very straightforward. My check arrived an I got books and other living expenses paid. This was great. Accomplishing my dream.

Then I find out that I am accepted as a transfer student to a 4 year BA. Wow! The Big Time! I worked hard. Why not? I accepted. But, sir, you will need to come up with a few thousand dollars. Sign here, sign there. It wasn’t like a mortgage, just a few slips a paper. It was a very covert process. But, I noticed that each loan the university would receive hundreds of dollars totaling thousands of dollars over the years. 

All of this loan business started around 2000-2001. We are now in 2012 and I owe 140,000 dollars from education obtained from public schools. I couldn’t work a full time job, so I had to borrow money for living expenses too. I even received a few scholarships, but they were small. 

I have a BA and an MS. I support a spouse and my parents. I owe $140,000 dollars. My monthly payments are $900 dollars a month. I can’t afford a home—barley make rent, groceries and transportation. I would gladly bargain for half. There should be a cap on our monthly payments. $900 is reasonable if you’re making $150,000 a year. But $40,000 and 50,000 dollar salaries today aren’t what they were ten years ago. 

Rent has gone up, gas has gone up, food, utilities, everything—all the life essential resources have increased, but salary stays the same. I can’t afford it.